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The Stanley Cup has been awarded, trades have been made, free agency has slowed to a crawl, and that means preparation for the 2026-27 season is in full swing. It is still too early to make firm determinations about player draft value, but there is one source we can look to for average draft positions.

Underdog Fantasy runs a best ball league called The Best Puck Classic every year. For those unfamiliar with the format, best balls are draft-and-hold leagues. That means you draft your team before the season and then that's it – there are no trades, waivers, or roster moves; what you draft is what you have. Each week, the players with the most fantasy production at each position – on this site it's centre (C), wing (W), defence (D), goalie (G), and flex (C/W/D) – are counted towards your final total. In these particular drafts, 18 players are drafted and only the best scores from two centres, three wingers, one defenceman, one flex, and one goalie count each week.

*Note: Neither I, nor Dobber, nor Dobber Hockey in general is affiliated with Underdog in any way. I just use this site for some season-long fantasy leagues, particularly this format, and they are the earliest with actionable data.

In this instance, it is a season-long league that plays like a head-to-head format. There are thousands of entries, and the entries are split into individual 12-team leagues. The top three teams in the fantasy regular season from each individual 12-team league move to the next round where they're re-assigned to a 10-team league for a playoff round. Then those playoff leagues are cut down after another round, and so forth. It is also a points league that counts production as such:

• Goals – 6
• Assists – 4
• Power-Play Points – 0.5
• Shots – 1
• Hits – 0.5
• Blocks – 1
• Goalie Win – 6
• Goalie Save – 0.6
• Goalie Goal Against – (-3)

So, it is a season-long league that incorporates what is functionally head-to-head playoffs and uses a points format. Cool? Cool.

Their drafts started a couple of weeks ago, and it's the middle of July so only about 50 drafts have been completed, but it does give us an idea of early ADPs, so let's look at some players whose early draft positions stand out. Today will be centres only, and then we'll move to other positions in future Ramblings.  

Macklin Celebrini (San Jose Sharks – C)

Celebrini was a player I was incredible bullish on last year and ended up drafting in over half my leagues, sometimes paying a second-round price. I thought even a second-round price was fair, and after his outstanding 2025-26 season, he's now being drafted as a top-3 pick:

Last year with this scoring system, Celebrini finished with the third-most fantasy points and was fourth by FPs per game. Obviously elite, but it's notable that he finished nearly 1.2 FPs per game behind Connor McDavid and 1.7 FPs per game behind Nathan MacKinnon. To get to that next level, he needs to add something like 8 goals and 50 shots, or 3 goals, 8 assists, 5 power-play points, 5 hits, and 30 shots, or some similar combination. It isn't a heavy ask, but he does need to be (roughly) a 50-goal, 70-assist, 300-shot player to climb into the MacKinnon/McDavid tier. The last player age-20 or younger to manage 50 goals and 70 assists in a season was Wayne Gretzky in 1980-81 (per StatHead). I believe Celebrini is among the elite in the league, it just seems like a lot to ask.

Tage Thompson (Buffalo Sabres – C)

In the Best Puck Classic last season, Tage was often going somewhere in the third round, frequently between picks 27-36. After finishing as 1 of 9 players with at least 40 goals, 40 assists, and 3.0 shots per game, Tage's ADP has crept to the top of the second round:

In this format last season, Tage finished 4^th among centres by total points, but the FPs per game gap between him and Celebrini (1.78) was larger than the gap between Tage and the 58^th-ranked forward (Dylan Cozens).

I will form a firmer opinion once I have finished my projections (probably won't be until mid-August because of some vacation time coming up), but that FP gap is one of the reasons I don't really like taking Tage this high. He turns 29 years old in October so he very well may have already had his career year. At this draft position, I would prefer to wait on taking another centre later on and focus on the elite wingers or defencemen like Matt Boldy, Brady Tkachuk, Martin Necas, or Zach Werenski. Then again, this is the first year where the Best Puck Classic is counting two centres each week rather than one.  

Wyatt Johnston (Dallas Stars – C)

Going 1.5 picks after Thompson is Wyatt Johnston, who climbs from a fifth-round pick last year to a mid-second pick this year.

I don't get this one. It isn't that Johnston isn't a great offensive player, but he finished 24^th among forwards by FPs per game last season, and there were three defencemen who out-produced him. Add a handful of goalies and Johnston wasn't a top-30 player in this format. Maybe he takes another huge step this season, but he has a shot-volume problem thanks to averaging around 2.5-2.6 shots per game in each of the last three seasons. At that level, he needs to be a 50-goal, 50-assist player to pay off a mid-second round pick. Again, it seems the addition of a second centre position in this format is getting people to draft centres higher, but if I get to the middle of the second round and I've missed out on all the top-7 or top-8 centres on the board, I am probably just going to wait a while, build middle-value depth, and hope someone pops.

Sebastian Aho (Carolina Hurricanes – C)

This is the moment I realized that drafters are heavily targeting centres because of the move from one centre to two centres counting each week. Aho just posted his lowest goal total in an 82-game season since his rookie year, a career-low shot total, and his ADP has climbed from a 6^th-7^th round pick last year to a top-50 pick this year:

Just in terms of raw fantasy point production last season, Aho, was roughly a top-75 option in this format. As with Tage, Aho turns 29 years old this year (later this week, actually), so it's very possible that he's already had his career year (36 goals and 89 points in 2023-24). The position scarcity argument is the one to make for taking Aho at this point, but there are maybe 4-5 centres I'd rather draft who also have later ADPs, so this is a situation that is a firm No For Me, Dawg.  

Adam Fantilli (Columbus Blue Jackets – C)

Going as the 20^th centre off the board is a player who has yet to have a 60-point season:

This one is very interesting to me. Despite the lack of raw point production, Fantilli was solid last year, finishing tied as the 68^th forward by FPs per game. He did that shooting 11.2% against a two-year average of 14.1%, and registering a point on just 64.1% of goals scored with him on the ice against a two-year average of 69.8%. More normal percentages would have meant a 65-point season, and maybe we feel better about his outlook.

Regardless, Fantilli added 1:25 per game of ice time, and with Boone Jenner heading to the Washington Capitals, Fantilli should crest the 19-minute mark and maybe even push for 20. With some additional ice time and a percentage rebound, Fantilli can be a 30-goal, 40-assist, 225-shot forward. Add his typically solid peripherals, and that is the stat line of a top-40 forward. He obviously has a lot of upside beyond that, too, so while this ADP is a big jump from last year (he was often drafted outside the top-100 picks), not only do I understand the jump, but agree with it.  

Logan Cooley, Nick Schmaltz, and Vincent Trocheck (Utah Mammoth – C)

The addition of Trocheck, and matching of Barrett Hayton's offer sheet, has given the Mammoth a lot of centre depth, and a mess for us. That is what makes the ADPs for these three Utah centres fascinating:

Cooley and Schmaltz have near-identical ADPs while Trocheck is going over two rounds later. It should be noted that last year, Schmaltz led them by FPs per game (7.77), Trocheck wasn't far behind (7.6), and Cooley was a distant third place (7.06). I understand that Trocheck is at an age where we worry about decline, but a lot of Schmaltz's value came from skating a career-high 1617 minutes – adding Trocheck should cut into that. I am also firm in my belief that Utah traded for him to give them a right-handed centre who is great on face-offs and can play net-front on the power play. Schmaltz is a right-handed centre who is bad on face-offs and played the net-front on the power play. Draw your own conclusions.

Ryan Hartman (Minnesota Wild – C)

In this format last year, Hartman finished as a top-100 forward by fantasy points per game. Minnesota let Mats Zuccarello walk and did not bring in a top forward to replace him. Knowing this, here is where Hartman's ADP sits:

The argument against Hartman is Danila Yurov. He is a highly touted prospect and is a big reason why Minnesota was fine including Marco Rossi in the trade for Quinn Hughes.

I am not sold on Yurov just yet. There is a difference between making the leap to the NHL and being a top-6 centre on a Stanley Cup contender. A team of that calibre cannot have a centre who has some skill but needs to be carried by his wingers. On the flipside, Hartman has years of being a capable second-line pivot. To me, Yurov has to win the job, and Hartman has to lose it. That matters.

Maybe Yurov takes some top PP time, but maybe not, and it isn't as if Hartman needed a lot of PP production to be successful last year (7 PPPs). If Hartman can hold on to a second line, top PP role for an extended period, his ADP as the 55^th centre off the board is great value. As a fourth or fifth centre on a fantasy roster, that's a guy I want to gamble on.